This invention relates to therapeutic and bathing systems, especially suited for non-ambulatory, immobile patients found in canvalescent homes, nursing homes or hospitals. The bathing system greatly reduces patient handling and transfer, saving time and more importantly increasing safety for the patient.
Statistically many accidents involving non-ambulatory (and ambulatory) patients in institutional care centers occur during the transfer of the patient from a wheelchair to or from the bath. The bathing environment is especially hazardous because the patient is wet and more difficult to hold firmly during transfer and removal from the bathing device.
Conventionally, the patient is placed into a wheelchair from a bed, wheeled to a bathing device, transferred into and out of a bath and wheeled back to the bed. This requires four separate transfers, at least one while the patient is wet.
Elaborate patient transfer systems, some including hoists, powered lifts and the like, are shown in the prior art as attempts to make patient transfer into and out of the bathing cabinet more safe. Examples are shown in U.S. Pat. No. 3,703,733 and U.S. Pat. No. 3,169,253. Johansson in U.S. Pat. No. 3,662,409 shows a transfer cart wherein the chair of the wheelchair is separable from the frame and wheels and is hydraulically assisted to transfer the patient into the cabinet on rails. This requires additional wheels, rails a hydraulic boost system, and safety locks to prevent chair separation and the additional hazard to the patient that the transfer mechanism will not function properly.
Another approach to the problem is to provide a portable bathing cabinet that is brought to the patient's bedside, such as shown in U.S. Pat. No. 3,616,467 and U.S. Pat. No. 3,832,740.
Segar in U.S. Pat. No. 3,169,253 shows a mobile chair for shower facilities that has grooved wheels that engage rails in a shower area. Because the wheels are exposed to the shower spray, the wheels and frame when wet will create wet and slippery floors beyond the shower area, creating additional hazards.
The present invention overcomes the problems discussed above by providing a practical, safe, and relatively inexpensive bathing system that does not require hydraulically assisted components, eliminates body transfer of the patient between the wheelchair and the bathing cabinet, while leaving the floor area surrounding the bathing cabinet free from water or soapy liquids. The patient can also have a foot bath and perianal spray using the present invention.